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All Things Considered / The Why

There's more to every story if you take the time to tell it. The Why gets to the "why" behind an issue that matters in your community, diving deep to give you a fuller view – and an illuminating listening experience.

Philadelphia’s finances going from bad to worse

City Controller Alan Butkovitz says Philadelphia isn’t doing as well as projected in tax collections and that will make the city’s budget even more difficult to balance.

“Sales tax revenues is the most dramatic shortfall, they were expecting to make 25 million dollars this month and they only made 18 million, that’s nearly one third less than we expected.”

The controller says the dip shows merchants aren’t doing the business they want either. Mayor Michael Nutter says the decline shows why the city can’t deplete it’s available cash to pay for the police and firefighters he plans to cut.

“We’re underperforming because of the recession and it’s continued impact on unemployment.”

The mayor says he hasn’t had any further budget discussions with council and is planning to implement his cuts.